Van Bibber and Others eBook

“I don’t see that there is anything wrong
in painting a picture to order, is there? You
paint a portrait to order, why shouldn’t you
paint an old house, or a beautiful castle on a cliff,
with the sea beyond it? If you wish, I’ll
close with you now and call it a bargain.”

Mrs. Carstairs had been standing all this time with
an unframed picture in one hand, and a dust brush
in the other, and her husband had been sitting on
the rolled-up Turkish rug and trying not to look at
her.

“I’d like to do it very well,” he
said, simply.

“Well, that’s good,” replied the
railroad king, heartily. “You’ll need
a retaining fee, I suppose, like lawyers do; and you
put your best work on the two pictures and remember
what they mean to me, and put the spirit of
home into them. It’s my home you’re
painting, do you understand? I think you do.
That’s why I asked you instead of asking any
of the others. Now, you know how I feel about
it, and you put the feeling into the picture; and
as to the price, you ask whatever you please, and
you live at my houses and at my expense until the work
is done. If I don’t see you again,”
he said, as he laid a check down on the table among
the brushes and paint tubes and cigars, “I will
wish you a merry Christmas.” Then he hurried
out and banged the door behind him and escaped their
thanks, and left them alone together.

The pictures of Breton life and landscape were exhibited
a year later in Paris, and in the winter in New York,
and, as they bore the significant numerals of the
Salon on the frame, they were immediately appreciated,
and many people asked the price. But the attendant
said they were already sold to Mr. Cole, the railroad
king, who had purchased also the great artistic success
of the exhibition—­an old farm-house with
a wintry landscape, and the word “Home”
printed beneath it.

ANDY M’GEE’S CHORUS GIRL

Andy M’Gee was a fireman, and was detailed every
evening to theatre duty at the Grand Opera House,
where the Ada Howard Burlesque and Comic Opera Company
was playing “Pocahontas.” He had nothing
to do but to stand in the first entrance and watch
the border lights and see that the stand lights in
the wings did not set fire to the canvas. He
was a quiet, shy young man, very strong-looking and
with a handsome boyish face. Miss Agnes Carroll
was the third girl from the right in the first semi-circle
of amazons, and very beautiful. By rights she
should have been on the end, but she was so proud and
haughty that she would smile but seldom, and never
at the men in front. Brady, the stage manager,
who was also the second comedian, said that a girl
on the end should at least look as though she were
enjoying herself, and though he did not expect her
to talk across the footlights, she might at least
look over them once in a while, just to show there
was no ill feeling. Miss Carroll did not agree
with him in this, and so she was relegated to the